Sab se phele Pakistan

Hmmmmm…one thing I love about Pakistan…

When I was told about this topic I got really excited. The patriotism running wild in my blood. I had recently stated that my patriotism has gotten cold somewhere along the course of my life. But suddenly hearing the planning from Rabia baji I felt maybe it hasn’t gotten that cold after all.

So I got really excited in the beginning but then I thought what would I write yaar. Everything in my mind is too childish, but well I’ll still go with it. It might be childish but these are the things that I really do love about Pakistan, my Pakistan. And I’ll go on and write more than one thing, why restrict myself?

1. I used to state to my friends “I can’t possibly live anywhere besides Pakistan”. Why? they would ask. And I would simply say “I won’t get these bun-kababs, gol-gappas and gola-gandas anywhere else”.
And believe me, this is the reason, at least one of them. Sometimes these bun-kababs seem more tastier than KFC Zinger. They do to me. And gola-gandas…. just don’t ask about them.




2. We, Pakistanis have an amazing history. This is a land which came into being without any war fought, not a war with swords and tops, but it was a war of courage, bravery and patriotism, patriotism for a country that hadn’t been born at that time, but people still had patriotism. They still loved it, without it existing. The love which led them to sacrifice everything for Pakistan. This country may have been won without any actual war, but still so many things were lost in the process. This is the beauty of this country, an amazing history depicting stories of great, brave people, who fought the fight against all odds. I love it when people talk about Quaid-e-Azam and what a great personality he was, or about Allama Iqbal and his unforgettable inspiring poetry, or any other hero and their heroic acts. This is what separates us from others but unfortunately this is exactly what we have forgotten.

3. And I love the fact, that somewhere deep down we all are patriotic people. That Pakistanis become jazbati for Pakistan. (Sometimes this characteristic of ours is used against Pakistan). That even if we keep on complaining about Pakistan, we can still find some good things to say about it. That when this idea was floated around, no body, not even a single person backed out, they all agreed to, they all loved the concept, and then they all chimed in. That we can take out time from our so-called busy schedules to pass on text messages wishing “Happy Independence”. That I could hear our National Anthem in the morning (today). That the National Anthem was followed by National Songs. That we still love hearing these songs and feel patriotism. That we are still proud of this country, our country. That no matter what we say about it, we still call it “Our Country, Our Pakistan”, the our showing our love for it.


Happy Independence!!!

The Countdown has begun.....

Yup, the countdown has begun. You ask what countdown??? If you are really asking this question then better wake up yaar, get yourself detached from your work load and look at the calendar. It's that time of the year again... yup it's August, the month when we got our independence.
But yeah I know this countdown doesn't seem as exciting as your own birthday. But I still like it when the tv channels show 10 days to go etc. I simply love this countdown.
I remember how I used to proudly attach a batch to my uniform back in school, how we sang songs in the 14th August function every year, how I decorated my home's gallery with flags and all.
Don't do that now. I guess my patriotism has damned a bit with my age.
Any ways, to honor this month, I have changed the look of my blog. It's the month when you see green flags everywhere, and thus my blog should reflect it. :)

Happy Independence Month!!! :)

And yeah, 6 days to go. :D

Class of 2008

Last Saturday, this time, I was getting ready for my convocation.
Finally.... the day I have waited for my entire life.
I also wanted to be there, you know, up on the stage, receiving a degree amidst ceiling-bursting clapping. But I never got a chance in school or college. And prayed that they don't decide not to have it after Bachelors as well. But thankfully, they didn't, in fact we got our convocation the next month we graduated. And I was so so excited. I got through the entire week just thinking that I have my convo on Saturday, and I'll be going for rehearsal on Friday. The rehearsal seemed charming because all of us friends will be meeting there, it wasn't like we have been apart for long, but still yaar......
Any ways, finally they day came for which I was waiting my entire life. And I was getting ready for it... But we reached a bit late, as we had anticipated that the convocation would definitely start late as the chief guest never arrive on time but well this one did, right on time. And this time I was late. But no worries, nothing very very important had happened before I reached.
First other departments were called for conferment of degree. Then it was time for the CS Batch, that would be us. We all were told to stand up and make a queue long before our turn so that we were ready when it was finally our turn. And then we all walked up on the stage... girls in the center, guys on both side and we have so many guys in our class that they made a second row behind us. So many people stood there taking our pictures.. ahh it was amazing, absolutely amazing... and our Rector conferred us the degree and said Congratulations...... it was again amazing. Four years of effort finally paid off. Those assignments, the tension of projects that got you close to killing everyone around you, the days before your exams... all of that.. all of that hard work, and wishing and praying finally paid off. We have finally graduated.
We are officially "Class of 2008".

And the day went fabulous.... there was one room where photographers were sitting so that any student can go and get himself or herself photographed.
The lunch was good too, pretty good.
And then of course, being our selves, we had our own photo session. :)

But the day ended... as all things and all days do... but it was a day thoroughly, utterly, completely enjoyed, and too it's fullest.

The next day I woke up and searched the entire news paper for a news about our convocation, I wanted the entire world to know that we have graduated that we are the "Class of 2008", but there was no news :(
Next day, my batch mate and now my colleague told me that Daily Times has published OUR news :)

When you miss your friends…..

You miss your friends at the most oddest of times.

You miss them not only when you are depressed, don’t know your way through an assignment, or you are too low for you don’t know how to deal with the things life is throwing at you. It’s not only in these moments that you miss your friends but at other occasions too, when you never imagined you would miss them, at least I never thought I would.

Some of these moments are:

• At lunch time, when you sit and eat your lunch all alone. Even when the lunch comprises of your favorite…. things just don’t seem that good when you don’t get to share it with your friends, when you don’t get to talk to them and laugh at the most silliest of jokes, and take longer to eat a sandwich that would normally take only 10 minutes, saying “yaar khana hamesha aram se khana chaye”

• When you are sifting through a magazine and you find something pretty interesting, you look around to find someone you can share it with and find no one who would be able to understand why you find it amazing.

• When it’s raining heavily outside and you don’t have anyone to walk with and enjoy the blessing.

• When you have to walk to the bus stand alone, with no one there who would listen to you complaining about buses, and your constant rambling on a topic no one has an answer to namely “Why does Karachi have such a situation of public transport?”, when you have no one who would reply to your comments with their own mustard with equal detest.

• When you watch an amazingly nice movie or a surprisingly stupid one, and you don’t have anyone around who would discuss it with you.

• When you log on to “cricinfo.com” to read up on the current match between Pakistan and India and you have no one else around who shares the same excitement and no one who doesn’t share the excitement at all and continues saying “come on yaar, we have work to do!”. (Yeah you even miss them scolding you.)

• When you buy a brand new mobile and don’t have anyone you could show off to.

• When you finally achieve something and you don’t have anyone to shake hands, deliver a hearty congratulations and then hug and hug tightly.

• When you don’t have anyone to play “Name Place Animal Thing” with to kill your time or maybe to waste it.

• When you don’t have anyone you could waste your time with right before a Final exam when you should actually be studying but realize that there are better and much more important things in life than studying like the reasons you didn’t study last night.

• When a quiz is announced in a class, you look back and don’t find a friendly face or to be more correct the face of a friend whose expressions would prove that you’ll not be the only one failing this quiz.

It’s 5:40 in the morning, and my head was roaring with the above, and so I decided I should post them on my blog. My net’s not working so I am writing these on Microsoft Office Word. Will post it as soon as possible.

(The above was written yesterday, 30th July, 2008)

Random Thought

It's true, I have finally realized, that it's not until you loose something that you realize it's importance.

Back in school, I enjoyed going to my school, even if it meant waking up early in the morning, even if it meant taking classes the entire day including classes of subjects like Sindhi and Maths (I used to hate Maths), even if it meant doing loads of homework. I still loved being there, being a part of it, having friends, having those long chat sessions with friends in the morning before the bell rang. I remember I especially got there early so that I can chat. My home was nearby, I could have easily gotten there only 5 minutes to spare, but no I reached my school early so that I can talk with my friends and have fun. Oh this brings up so many memories, that if I start writing about them it would just fade away the actual topic (the title hasn't come to me yet) :)
But still we never failed to complain about our teachers and the school management and how they fail to care about their most important assets, their students meaning us. Ten years spent complaining and moaning on things we didn't have the authority to change.

And then it was College, an addition of two years to my fantastic memories collection. Two years spent full of enjoyment. My friends and I sat together and were always found laughing. Oh those good old days. Thoroughly enjoyed.

And then it was University. I didn't realize that I was enjoying it. The first three years were okay but the last one was fabulous. I didn't know then that I would miss this place terribly once it all gets over.

And you know what the problem is. When I told anyone that this is my last year, I am wishing for it to end soon. All they had to add was "Life would be much tougher afterwards."
No one, not a single soul, gave me the tinniest of hope that things would be fine in the future too. It felt like they wanted to imply that my life would get over once this last session of my academic career gets over. Everyone made me feel like there is nothing good to look forward to. And I hated it. Come on yaar!!! (again roaming away from the topic)

Well anyways, the point is once the time passes you by with a swift you realize that it was good when you were going through it. You may not have liked it then, there may be somethings you would rather hadn't happened, but still it was good. And some part of you wishes that you could have enjoyed it more while it lasted.....

End of another inane post with no relevance to anything.... :)

Sometimes....

Sometimes you have to leave a thing that you hold important for a thing that is important,

Sometimes you have to make the right decision even if it doesn't give you an pleasure,

Sometimes you have to give up the thing you love for the thing you need...

Tair-e-la hoti

Tair-e-la hoti, us risk se maut achi,
Jis risk se aati ho parvaz mein kotahi.
-Allama Iqbal

Don't get this verse, but still loved it. Read an entire novel with the topic "Tair-e-la hoti" but still didn't get it. Should ask my mom now :)